The Commonwealth Games might be the only sporting event for which the most-Googled terms are asking what they are and why they exist. One of the top stories on BBC Sport at the time of writing was simply headlined: “What are the Commonwealth Games?”
It’s a good question. They are an anachronistic idea, vaguely defined, thinly justified, a relic of Britain’s imperial past, like a mildly offensive heirloom quadrennially hauled down from the attic, modern sport’s unwelcome inheritance from another age.
